Oh what a Week

Things have been busy! But I had a good two days in San Diego. Had more students in both orientations that I expected but that's okay. I had one machine that I couldn't get working but hopefully in the long run it won't be a problem.

Tomorrow will be another fun day. Have faculty/staff kick off first thing in the morning then I'm helping the techs receive the faculty laptops for refresh. Then around 11am I'm off to the airport to fly to Sacramento for APU's first NCAA football game. Should be fun or at least hopefully it will be fun. I'm staying in Sacramento with one of my favorite families then driving back to Azusa with them on Friday.

I've already had some pictures show up on the APU Website... you can check the photo credits page if you want.  Hopefully going to have a good year and lots of fun pictures!

Brass Goggles

Yes, again I'm talking about the Steam Powered Giraffe, but this is just a fun song... yes, I'm crazy... it's August one of the busiest months of my year to give you an idea of just how  crazy things are here's a little bit of what is happening:

Tomorrow and Thursday I'm in training so I can develop the training for a new service to be introduced in early October.

Monday, I'll have new employees training, new faculty orientation, and our meet the teams event with our students (and guess who is coordinating a lot of it)

Tuesday, not as crazy, a group photo of our students and a training class with our students where I just have no idea what I'm going to say.

Wednesday, wow, not too bad, just a meeting to discuss the training I need to develop from the training I'm doing this week

Thursday, I have the first of 5 or 6 new student orientations for the school of nursing and doing phone training with one of our student groups.

Friday, I'm playing keyboards for our group worship time for the end of training week and then the ever popular "Can of Consequence" training. Always a good time!

Saturday, I have another new student orientation, though they haven't told me what time yet...

Sunday will be pretty laid back just church in the morning.

Monday the 27th, more than likely new employees training in the morning then heading to San Diego!!! to do an orientation for School of Ed. And if all goes well, a trip to the zoo to see my favorite Steam Powered Giraffe perform and if I'm not dead tired heading over to SeaWorld to try shooting fireworks one more time. (and yes I have passes to both parks, and if you're counting for Legoland too)
Spending the night in SD

Tuesday, I'll sleep in, then head over to SeaWorld for a couple of hours before doing another new student orientation for School of Nursing. Once I'm done with it, I just might have to head over to the zoo one last time. Not sure how late I'll stay since I have to drive home afterwards. But I have to make sure to get something signed for Mark in one of the visits there. I have an idea of what I want to do, I just don't think I have very good pictures of Sam and Michael. Lots of great pics of the robots.

Wednesday, I have my 3rd orientation for the School of Nursing in Azusa and that this point nothing else.

Thursday morning we have our annual Faculty/Staff kickoff event. It's our yearly pep talk from the President, who does an amazing job. He's such a great man and a good guy! As soon as that event is over I'll jet back to the other campus with the computer techs to help receive laptops that are being refreshed. At about 11, I hope to be heading to the airport to catch a flight to Sacramento because I'm shooting APU's first football game as a NCAA Division II team against UC Davis. I'm crashing at the home of one of my favorite photo buddies and then leaving at the ungodly out of 4 AM to head south with him and his wife.

Hopefully, Friday will be quiet.

Saturday, September 1 is the first soccer games under the lights and I'll be there to shoot at least the girls game. I also have the birthday party of my favorite 2 year old that day. Lots of fun photos there!

Sunday again will be a day of rest.

I was really hoping to head back to San Diego to catch the last perform of the Steam Powered Giraffe at the zoo for the summer. But that is looking less likely since the orientation that was slated for Tuesday probably won't happen. SAD SAD Face...

So, you kind see what I'm really enjoying having some fun music in my life. So if your seated comfortably with your bag of pork rinds and your sandwich... this is a sing along song....

 

Obsessive–compulsive disorder

Sometimes I feel like I'm OCD, though I don't really have any habits that would indicate it, I think it's more like the "pure-O" which is OCD without overt compulsions could, by one estimate, characterize as many as 50 percent to 60 percent of OCD cases.^[20] Rather than engaging in observable compulsions, the person with this subtype might perform more covert, mental rituals, or might feel driven to avoid the situations in which particular thoughts seem likely to intrude. (Wikipedia)

My newest obsession... the Steam Powered Giraffe. Tim introduced us to this unique and interesting group about a month ago. Then Mark and I saw them perform at the San Diego Zoo and I loved them. Their show is fun and entertaining and I love their vocal arrangements. The three main members of the groups are dressed as robots, having a background in mime they do a great job being robots. They've been doing 4 shows a day at the zoo since June 23 and will finish up Labor Day.

The end of July Mark, Tim, Regina and I went down the end of July and again it was fun times. I'm going to be able to go down again the last week of August and MAYBE September 3rd.

Anyway, let me share with you a little taste of the Steam Powered Giraffe with my favorite video, Automatonic Electronic Harmonics

2nd Annual Mother's Day Hike

2012-05-13 Mother's Day Hike, a set on Flickr.

Last year Erwin, Mark, and I hiked Garcia Trail for Mother's Day. Tim had left Mother's Day morning for UCO tour. Again, this year Tim is on UCO tour but he DID text message me this morning to wish me a happy mother's day.

Mark cooked me breakfast and served it to me in bed. Waffles and "doctored" eggs with a glass of milk. It was quite good, though my body doesn't care to eat that much food that early.

After a wonderful service at church it was lunch with my in-laws at Philly's Best, which is always good.

Then we came home and changed and took off to check out the Michael Antonovich Trail in San Dimas. It was a nice trail not as rugged as Garcia, though it was a little hard that to get back to the car you have the steepest climb. It had some shaded areas and a stream that we had to cross multiple times, but it was a nice hike.

Came home to watch the Kings beat the Coyotes in game on of the conference championship. And In-n-Out for dinner! Doesn't get much better than this!

Here are some of the pictures I took, enjoy:

SeaWorld San Diego

Today Mark and I went to SeaWorld. I so LOVE SeaWorld and today was a good day. Got to see my dolphin show as well as Pet’s Rule, Sea Lions, both the day time show and the night show and the Shamu show. The picture below is Mark sliding down a snow bank for the first time ever. Of course, the worker didn’t believe Mark was only 12. Poor guy, he’s so tall and his voice is deep and he’s got the whole mustache thing happening.  But in just 25 days he turns 13. A lot scary to me… 

 

The polar bears enjoying a mid-morning nap.  Aren’t they cute!?!?

It’s summer on the south pole so made for some great pictures.

Pets’ Rule celebrating the holidays!

And of course, the dolphin show…

Shark tank as if you didn’t know:

Turtle Reef…

Sea lion and otter show – CSI Miami Style

Everyone’s favorite" “Shamu”

Sea Lion and Otter’s Night Before Christmas full of fun as always.

It’s kind of funny that several of the jokes in the Sea lion shows revolve around Pepsi and after tomorrow Seaworld will no long be serving Pepsi products. January 1 begins a 10 year contract with Coke. Many ways I’m excited about that, I’ve always preferred Coke to Pepsi. But it was at SeaWorld I had my very first Code Red Mountain. I’ll miss that, but hey… things change, that’s just life.

IMT East–THe Ugly

I have mentioned a few times that IMT East is a triple wide trailer.  Keep in mind there is no foundation on for a trailer (I’ve mentioned that as well!) So for many years IMT East has not only been the home of the Academic Computer Lab, programmers, developers, and the like, it has been home to possums, raccoons, skunks and who knows what else. 

So many times we came to work on the morning to the “lovely” aroma of an angry skunk or worse yet when the circle life concludes and we come in to the smell of decomp (yes, I’m a CSI fan! Not sure about the adding of Ted Danson to the cast, should be interesting). Oh how I won’t miss this place…

Oh and then there’s the musty smell, I’m not going to miss the entering the office and going into a sneezing fit.  Leave the office the sneezing, itchy eyes go away, like magic!  Oh how I won’t miss this place…

Then, of course, there was the Northridge Earthquake.  I came into the office later that morning and met up with Sue in the ACC and noticed the sunlight shining through the wall near the roof line on the north end of the building. Every earthquake I think of that lovely light shining through…  Oh HOW I won’t miss this place… (though 680 is a little scary when you think about earthquakes)

There’s the sloping floor in several places the best is in Don’s office. But I’m just too tired to go into all that… let me just say I OH SO WON’T MISS THIS PLACE!!!!!!!!!!!!!

IMT East–The Bad

Disclaimer -  The names have been changed to protect the innocent! Oh wait… I won’t use any names, but if you happen to resemble the people I mention please do not be offended. I love all of you, and I know that I am probably the most annoying person in IMT-East.  So remember, this is considered good, clean, fun!

First off, cubicle life is hard on an introvert. Now many people will argue that I’m not an introvert. I’m loud and obnoxious, but as this website defines:  By Myers-Briggs' definition, an introvert derives energy from his or her internal world of emotions and ideas, while an extrovert draws from the outside world of people and activities for spiritual sustenance. ( http://www.theintrovertzcoach.com/definitions_of_introvert.html) Whether you believe it or not, I am an introvert and this latest project has been exhausting to me!  But I digress…  there’s more of that coming I’m sure!

There is no real privacy in our world of IMT-E. Every conversation can be heard over the cubicle walls.  Even when you whisper, someone might just whisper from over the wall “I can still hear you!!!” This can also be very awkward as a one of a few women who work in IMT-E. There has never been a truly inappropriate conversation but there have been talk of guy things that as a lady (and I use that term loosely) didn’t want to hear.  I really wish I could remember one, but I have gratefully forgotten.

Then there’s the fact that the building is a trailer and there is no foundation the floor presents a source of constant “entertainment.”  One individual we’ll call Bob tends to walk very heavy.  I keep waiting for the day when he walks so hard down the hallway that he just goes right through the floor.  You can tell the level of Bob’s intensity by how hard he walks down the hallway.  The whole building SHAKES! 

Then there is the breakout room, our own little conference room, with a speaker phone.   There have been times when a co-worker, we’ll call Bob, would make a conference call and it seemed like he was shouting into the phone.  He wasn’t he just has one of those great speaking voices that carries (to McDonalds). Thankfully Bob is a quick study and after I shut the door on his meetings a couple of times, he started shutting them at the beginning of his meeting.

Another thing about cubicles are the cubicle walls.  For some reason people love to walk down the hall running their finger down the wall.  WHY????  WHY???? WHY???? It makes me crazy!

Today, one of my co-workers, we’ll call him Bob, reminded me of another thing about IMT-East that makes me a little crazy (only sometimes) is that people can peek over the wall at me.  What would happen if I’m like picking my nose or something!?!?!?!  How embarrassing!  THANKFULLY I don’t think that’s happened… and if it has they quickly ducked out of sight.  Of course, Bob, chastised me today when I said I wasn’t going to miss him peeking over the top.  He said, I would get lonely down at the other end 680 next door to Jeff.  Maybe, eventually, but it’s going to be awhile.  Especially after days like today.  It was hard one… 

Life is always changing

For 25 years I have worked at APU and for those 25 years my office has been on east campus. It is by far the prettiest of the Azusa campuses. The only other one that comes close is San Diego, but that is only because it is 10 minutes from Seaworld!

The past several years my office has been in a "building" we refer to as IMT-East. Building is in quotes because it is actually a triple wide trailer. Two-thirds of the trailer has been at APU longer than I have been which is 25 and 1/2 years. So being a trailer you can only imagine some of the quirks we deal with. I want entertain with those quirks just yet, but trust me I will share the good the bad and the ugly of life in IMT-east. You see in just a couple of weeks our happy group is moving to a new location. This move brings about a lot of mixed emotions. Many things about this move thrill me beyond the wildest imagination, while other aspects sadden me to tears.

Over the next few days I will share the things I will miss from IMT-east and the things I won't. It is a time to reflect on the good, the bad, and the oh so ugly!

Life is always changing

For 25 years I have worked at APU and for those 25 years my office has been on east campus. It is by far the prettiest of the Azusa campuses. The only other one that comes close is San Diego, but that is only because it is 10 minutes from Seaworld!

The past several years my office has been in a "building" we refer to as IMT-East. Building is in quotes because it is actually a triple wide trailer. Two-thirds of the trailer has been at APU longer than I have been which is 25 and 1/2 years. So being a trailer you can only imagine some of the quirks we deal with. I want entertain with those quirks just yet, but trust me I will share the good the bad and the ugly of life in IMT-east. You see in just a couple of weeks our happy group is moving to a new location. This move brings about a lot of mixed emotions. Many things about this move thrill me beyond the wildest imagination, while other aspects sadden me to tears.

Over the next few days I will share the things I will miss from IMT-east and the things I won't. It is a time to reflect on the good, the bad, and the oh so ugly!

Take 2- why I should go to the gym

I am more than mildly annoyed that this my second attempt to post from iPad. I wrote this really nice article in blog press, hit save it promoted to publish when I said publish now it gave me my Facebook login page, but no post on my blog. So let's see if the Wordpress app does any better.

If you notice it is now after 1 AM and I am still awake. I didn't go to the gym because I felt like I had too much prep work to do for tomorrow. I am doing four different sessions tomorrow on 4 very different topics. The shortest one is 15 minutes whilemthe longest is an hour and a half.

I need sleep but my mind won't shut down. Gym tomorrow no matter how busy I am on Thursday. (I think I only have 3 classes that day)

Sleep. That's the next big challenge!

The Week on a Roller Coaster

 

Work has kept me busy and I’ve not really felt like I’ve had much to say. At least not much I should put in writing. This week has been hard, with extreme highs and lows and a little bit of everything in between.

The week started great when I was able to connect with a friend that I hadn’t seen in months. And as always with this particular friend there were lots of laughs. 

There was an extreme low as well, as a dear friend faced the worst outcome to his situation. Thankfully, he’s leaning on his God and trusting Him to get through the situation. I believe everything happens for a reason and God isn’t surprised by anything, I have to believe God will bring good out of this situation. It is still hard for me, to see my friend hurting and not knowing how to help.

There were lots a little hills and valleys to the week as well.  Everything from a snarky dean to incredibly inappropriate comments in a training class.  (and for the record I am not the one that made the inappropriate comment!)

The week ended on an up. I had lunch with our student managers which is fun to spend time with them and watch and listen to them laugh together. We also had red velvet cake which is always an UP! I think the biggest up of the end of the week was reconnecting with someone I’ve not talked to in over 20 years. He was one of the first sales reps I ever worked with at APU.  I’m looking forward to talking to him soon and catching up on life.

I’m glad it is the weekend. I get to sleep in tomorrow, though I do have to go to work and do an orientation. But there’s also a football scrimmage tomorrow. I’ll get to work with my new lens and well as get to hang out with my buddy Brian as he apologizes to the refs for my comments. Ya Right!

Tomorrow is the day!!

It’s hard to believe that it’s finally here! Tomorrow Mark and I take off for regions unknown. Hopefully things will go smoothly and I don’t kill Mark!

Hopefully, I’ll be able to blog through out the trip.  I’m looking forward to many photo ops! 

I’m in U2 mood tonight so I here’s one of my favorites:

Happy 4th of July

Enough Said

One Week to Go!

Next Sunday Mark and I are taking off on an adventure of a lifetime… at least hopefully it will be!. 

I’m looking forward to getting away and seeing some parts of California I’ve never seen before.  Hopefully I’ll get some great shots that I’ll post here or on Facebook.

Work has been hectic and I feel a little guilty leaving for two weeks, but I’ve been planning this trip for almost a year and I’m leaving training in good hands with Dante.  I just hope he doesn’t hate me by the time I get back. 

A busy week a head, not sure I’ll have much time to blog need to finish planning our trip.  I don’t have much scheduled for the trip home, but the 18th we’re going to Alcatraz Island.  I think Mark will have fun there. Of course, he is telling everyone he’s afraid I’m going to leave him there.  We’ll see…

Less Than 3 Weeks Until Vacation

 

It’s hard to believe that I’m less than 3 weeks from leaving for vacation!  I have my trip north planned.  Sequoia, Yosemite, Old Town Sacramento and Mark hopes lots of swimming opportunities.  

Haven’t figured out the journey home, though I think I’ll take Mark to San Francisco and Alcatraz Island, though he’s afraid I’ll leave him.  I’m hoping to check out China Town and of course Pier 39.  I want to stop in Pismo Beach to visit one of my “sons” family restaurant.  Not sure what else since I guess parts of PCH is still closed or one lane.  Need to figure it out soon.  Suggestions?

I actually broke down and bought the pictures from the photographers.  But I actually looked pretty good (for me that is!)

With my purchase I got $20 Credit to buy stuff from www.shutterfly.com so if you want a card… LET ME KNOW!?!?!?! 

Check it out!

5x7 Folded Card

View the entire collection of cards.

Chilling on a Friday Night

7:15 pm
This won't be posted until later since I'm not online and I still don't have my phone rooted yet.
This has been extremely long week, the project I am is going to keep me very busy this summer. I almost feeling guilty about my 2 week vacation this summer (almost is the keyword). It is a month until Mark and I start our adventure to northern California. I am looking forward to it but am a little nervous about the driving and the possible personality conflicts. Especially with the attitudes we were getting tonight.

Tonight I am playing bunco with a fun group of gals. They call me when they need a sub. The last two times I've played I took home the big pot ($28) for the most wins! Hopefully I'll do well tonight but I'm not banking on it. (pun intended!)

10:15 pm
Well bunco was a lot more exciting than we expected. Between round 3 and 4 Prudie our spry 93 year old took a spill down the steps. She told us to continue to play but we decided we should call the paramedics. Of course they need the huge fire engine, paramedics and ambulance. She seemed to be doing alright but the fact she has already broken a hip prior other 90th birthday. It was amazing how she bounced back. I haven't heard how she is doing, thankfully her blood pressure wasn't elevated, which is a good sign.

Bunco finally finished about 9:45 and I ended up being the biggest loser! I had only 8 wins and 16 loses. Of course, one of our subs was in the same boat so we had a roll off... And yes, I was indeed crowned the biggest loser. Which was nice because it meant I didn't have to pay!

Lastly, I must share a picture of LA's newest Dogers fan:



- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Oh what a week or Is this a good looking kid or what!

Do you remember the old Rocky and Bullwinkle cartoon? At the end of each cartoon the narrator would say something along the lines of "Join us next time for ... Or ....." and they would be two totally random titles. Anyway, I digress...

Monday through Wednesday was crazy busy and I felt like all I did was run. This summer is going to be a busy one with the Google Apps deployment and several offices transitioning to VoIP phones. Thankfully I will have some help with the GA training.

Somewhere in my social media world I shared the story of Mark asking me one morning if I knew how to tie a tie, which of course I had no clue. Being the resourceful child he is he found a YouTube video and figured it out. In fact, he did quite a nice job. Tonight he gave me the pictures to prove it.



Is he not a good looking kid!?
So yes, I will be spending the $42 to buy the pictures! He is so worth it!!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

New lens

I love taking pictures at APU's football games, the only problem is once it gets dark the quality of my photos go now. So for the past several months I have been putting money away (mainly from a photo job I do from time to time). Then for graduation I got some money, well to make a long story short I was able to buy my new lens! It is really nice! Though I had a scare today when it stopped autofocusing. Thankfully my super hero Staphon figured it out, of course completely on accident, but I don't care, it's working again.

Here's a picture of it:





Isn't it pretty? It is a tamron 70-200mm with a f2.8 this will give me much better shots at the football games and baseball and even basketball or volleyball! Now with now school I can play more! It will also be pretty cool for my vacation this summer.

I am trying a new program on the iPad to do my blogging, it is suppose to allow me upload YouTube videos. Not seeing how that is working.



Enjoy Stormy Monday with Eric Clapton

Well, not a bad program, I need to check out the web site to see if I am missing something. Enjoy a little Eric Clapton.

Hmmm... I don't see a place to add my categories... Another bummer... Found the place for category setting.


Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

I See a Bright Light

Not that light! The light of this long tunnel called graduate school. It is hard to believe I started working on the prereqs to the MAWL (Master of Arts in Worship Leadership) in fall 2003. I officially started the program in fall 2006 and now in spring 2011 I will be graduating! It has been a long journey but I am glad I did it. It was kind of surreal on Monday when I turned in the four copies of my paper. Fifty pages! I am happy with the paper hopefully the faculty members who will read it will like it as well. I think I will focus on the story of my call and my philosophy over on my Worship the 1! site. I might dual post parts of it. The whole process was a great reminder of how I got to where I am today.

I am shooting my first wedding this Saturday. I am really excited but really nervous this is their wedding for crying out loud! But I've learned so much in the past few months (have TONS more to learn) that will hopefully help me get good pictures.

A good friend was kind enough to loan me his nice nikon telephoto lens for the wedding. It is a crazy story but I don't think I'll tell it here. So since I had the lens yesterday and APU just happened to have a home baseball game last night I had to try out the lens. I got some really nice shots and the sports information guy used several on the APU webpage!!! I still get really excited about that, I know silly, but it is really cool to me."

I will have to post the pictures later. I'm tired and it is a pain trying to insert the pictures on the word press app for the iPad.

It is time for sleep!
Oh cool! I think I figured it out. But I am still too tired to add more. This is my favorite one. The first baseman getting plowed!

A Day in North San Diego County1

Today Mark and I went to LegoLand California to check out the new Star Wars section of Miniland.  They did a really great job, representing all of the movies.  It was rainy today and crowded two of my least favorite things with an amusement park.  Mark is so spoiled he doesn't ever want to stand in a very long line.  So we did the boats and I beat him. And we did Dino Coaster, which is always fun albeit short ride. Here are some shots of the new Legoland Star Wars area and a special sand castle honoring Star Wars.  And no, I don't know why the sand castles didn't melt in the rain.  (It was not ever a heavy rain.)

We ended up leaving Legoland around 2:00 and drove to the beach.  It was quiet but beautiful watching the waves crash into the shore.  As well as some birds fishing in the ocean.  Hopefully you can tell what they are doing from the pictures.



I wasn't really ready to go home, or rather hit rush our traffic in Orange County so we took 78 and headed over to the San Diego Zoo Safari Park (formerly known as the Wild Animal Park). We got there about 3:45 which meant FREE parking.  Even as pass holders the Safari park charges for parking.  (A reduced rate)  Also, we were able to get a choice parking spot close to the entrace. The park closed at 5 which meant not much time, but it worked out nicely. We strolled down to the African Safari tram and ended up being on the last one of the day.  I got some really nice pictures.  Interestingly, enough almost all of these pictures I shot manually.  Legoland and the beach I put the camera on auto.  At Legoland it was mainly because of the rain and not wanting to constantly play.  But here at the Safari Park I was lucky enough to find a good auto setting for the tram ride.  As well I was able to switch over to manual focus to get a couple of the pictures of the birds behind wire enclosures. Overall, pretty happy with the pics.



It was a really fun day. And I'm glad we went to the Safari Park since our passes expire at the end of April. I probably won't renew them for awhile, since this summer we're heading north.